Re: Microtuning the orchestra. - here's how to do it. (reply off-list)

Hello all. Back for another exciting issue of "GPO: Microtuning the Orchestra!"

I've been doing more experimentation with Garritan Personal Orchestra and
microtuning... It's starting to pay off. While waiting for Manuel to make a
fix to Scala that will solve some drop-out problems, I have been working
with Fractal Tune Smithy in the last day or two.

FTS is rather complicated to use, but I'm getting the hang of it, and it
works *very* well for MIDI relay of this multi-channel data without
dropouts or glitches. And it can use ".tun" files as well as Scala files
for tuning. (BTW, I"m using Robert's latest unreleased FTS 3.0 beta, so
with the shiping verion of FTS, this may not work as it does here.)

Here are 3 short examples of microtuned GPO.

The first two are the same piece of ho-hum music in "C minor" rendered
once in Carlos' harmonic scale on "C", and once in quarter-comma meanhone
(tuned with "3 flats").

http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-test15-harmonic-qtet.mp3
http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-test15-meantone-qtet.mp3

The last inferior little example, a bit icky on the reverb, is in 15-tet:

http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-Quartet-15tet.mp3

All of the 3 examples are: solo Flute, solo Oboe, Viola section, Cello
section. Used a bit of Ambience reverb.

Of course, none of these are good music, they just demonstrate 4 channels
of simultaneously re-tuned MIDI via pitch-bend. Played by Finale to FTS to
GPO, in real time. No tricks, no multi-tracks.

In next month's episode, I may get around to furthering my experiments
with GPO and Rhino together. I've already tried them together briefly, but
haven't gotten far enough to use them together microtonally in a piece of
music. Stay tuned!

Rick

>Hello all. Back for another exciting issue of "GPO: Microtuning the
>Orchestra!"
//
>http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-test15-harmonic-qtet.mp3
>http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-test15-meantone-qtet.mp3
//
>http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-Quartet-15tet.mp3
>
>All of the 3 examples are: solo Flute, solo Oboe, Viola section, Cello
>section. Used a bit of Ambience reverb.
>
>Of course, none of these are good music, they just demonstrate 4 channels
>of simultaneously re-tuned MIDI via pitch-bend. Played by Finale to FTS to
>GPO, in real time. No tricks, no multi-tracks.

These sound awesome!

Hey, just noticed a "reply off-list" in the subject line. Anybody
know if that's current?

-Carl

Rick,

These sound great....yet more reason for me to explore 15-equal, BTW.

-Aaron.

On Friday 14 October 2005 12:23 am, Rick McGowan wrote:
> Hello all. Back for another exciting issue of "GPO: Microtuning the
> Orchestra!"
>
> I've been doing more experimentation with Garritan Personal Orchestra and
> microtuning... It's starting to pay off. While waiting for Manuel to make a
> fix to Scala that will solve some drop-out problems, I have been working
> with Fractal Tune Smithy in the last day or two.
>
> FTS is rather complicated to use, but I'm getting the hang of it, and it
> works *very* well for MIDI relay of this multi-channel data without
> dropouts or glitches. And it can use ".tun" files as well as Scala files
> for tuning. (BTW, I"m using Robert's latest unreleased FTS 3.0 beta, so
> with the shiping verion of FTS, this may not work as it does here.)
>
> Here are 3 short examples of microtuned GPO.
>
> The first two are the same piece of ho-hum music in "C minor" rendered
> once in Carlos' harmonic scale on "C", and once in quarter-comma meanhone
> (tuned with "3 flats").
>
> http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-test15-harmonic-qtet.mp3
> http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-test15-meantone-qtet.mp3
>
> The last inferior little example, a bit icky on the reverb, is in 15-tet:
>
> http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/FTS-Quartet-15tet.mp3
>
> All of the 3 examples are: solo Flute, solo Oboe, Viola section, Cello
> section. Used a bit of Ambience reverb.
>
> Of course, none of these are good music, they just demonstrate 4 channels
> of simultaneously re-tuned MIDI via pitch-bend. Played by Finale to FTS to
> GPO, in real time. No tricks, no multi-tracks.
>
> In next month's episode, I may get around to furthering my experiments
> with GPO and Rhino together. I've already tried them together briefly, but
> haven't gotten far enough to use them together microtonally in a piece of
> music. Stay tuned!
>
> Rick
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>

Following up on the previous...

The other day I had a bit of trouble with FTS and non-repeating scales.
Robert showed me a work-around for the problem, and so I am finally able to
do something I've always dreamed about.

Here is 25 seconds of "Balinese" gongs and western orchestral instruments
tuned together in "Swastigitha Pelog" (after Sethares TTSS):

http://rm-and-jo.laughingsquid.org/temp/GPO/Orch-Gamelan-Test5.mp3

The mix isn't great, but you get the idea. You can certainly hear the
stretched octaves. The gongs are Rhino, the rest is GPO. Again, all done
simultaneously in real-time via relay.

Let me know when these examples get tedious... ;-) At this point, I'm
almost ready to try writing some real music with microtuned GPO.

Rick

--------------
Department of Non-essential Details

One thing I've discovered in the last day... If you're using Finale to
output on two MIDI devices, and you have one of them going through a relay
and the other not, you need to delay one by inserting some sort of delay
(i.e., sample delay) in the VST path of the device with the shorter relay
path. E.g. VAZ is tunable directly, but GPO requires FTS to relay the
retuned notes, so you have:

Finale -> FTS -> GPO -> output
Finale -> VAZ-Modular -> short-delay -> output

Just load a delay module in the VST path within VAZ or whatever.

Rick,

The adventure continues! *I* certainly don't find it tedious, as it is interesting to see how you are progressing, and finding not only the work-arounds but the actual logic paths to get the pieces of the puzzle to work together. And it isn't like there is a huge mountain of posting going on! :)

Looking forward to when you feel you've got your work scenario together and start moving on to pieces you *really* want to do!

Cheers,
Jon